


Apologies

by g33kg1rl



Series: Stolen Moments [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Allura apologizes, Feelings of Inadequacy, Internalized Homophobia, Keith (Voltron) Angst, Keith+Allura bonding, M/M, One-Sided Attraction, Pining, Voltron Season 2, not really because Allura points out Shiro feels the same
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-25
Updated: 2017-01-25
Packaged: 2018-09-19 20:25:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9459146
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/g33kg1rl/pseuds/g33kg1rl
Summary: Allura asked him to "be safe" and "come back to us."Keith just wants to run away when she added, "Especially to Shiro."Or:The story no one needed about why Keith just won't say anything to Shiro, and Allura calls him on it.





	

 

 

Apologies

 

Keith hugged Allura, not really knowing how to hug a woman. He hesitated to wrap his arms around her, not daring to dip his head to press his cheek to her hair or shoulder. When it became obvious she wouldn’t accept anything less, Keith gentled his hands atop her back; but it all felt so strange and foreign. He never had many memories of a mother. A father he knew how to deal with, an older-pseudo brother, and in school he knew how to handle the high-fives or quick hugs during a successful test simulation.

  
But it had always been different with woman anyway. He didn’t have that desire to surround them and protect them the way he had seen classmates do subconsciously. He didn’t want to curl his arm around them, even in the most innocent of fashions. He just didn’t know how it all worked.

  
And, to top it all off, she apologized to him, her words hoarse and muffled against his shoulder, and she apologized for something he couldn’t control. It just reaffirmed to him why he didn’t say what he really felt or wanted, because people would only see or think what they wanted, even when it was just who he was inside.

  
“Please, come back to us.”

“I will.” He said, his voice sounding different even to him.

Allura pulled away, just enough so she could look at him, and she smiled with her eyes once again aglow with warmth and caring. He could see the relief in her eyes after her confession, and though it helped settle him, it just felt like being in a foster home all over again when they found out what he was.

She wiped her cheek and laughed, soft yet confident in her decision, and he smiled back, just happy to know she no longer hated him for something in his blood that he had no control over.

“Especially to Shiro, if no one else.”

Keith felt a jolt, like hot water splashed down his spine only to be followed by ice poured over his shoulders. His mouth opened, his hands fell away and he nodded, though he could practically feel the blood drain from his face. “Yeah.”

Allura studied him then, staring in that way he saw her do sometimes to Lance, or especially Shiro. She tilted her head, full lips parting, then she frowned.

His eyes darted to the left.

“Why haven’t you told him?”

He didn’t know if he could talk, so he cleared his throat. “Told who what?” he regretted the way his voice cracked.

“Shiro. I thought at first it was simply you giving him time to adjust to being back after the Galra, then I thought maybe it was because he was oblivious… but its not that at all, is it?”

He pulled away from her, and darted his eyes to the right. Locating his helmet, he plotted the quickest escape from this horror film.

From the corner of his eye, he saw her own widen, brows raised and lips parted. No matter the alien differences between them, surprise still looked the same no matter what species. “You haven’t told him, have you?”

Keith bolted in his mind like a wounded animal, though his physical body moved smooth and purposeful, he had to bite down the urge to run away like a scared little kid. He turned his back to her and scooped up his helmet, reaching for the footholds to start his climb into the shuttle.

“Keith, wait.”

He didn’t want to wait, but the way she plead with him, he did stop, his back stiff, and his fingers played with his helmet, turning it in circles.

Her warm hand touched his arm and he avoided her eyes as she turned him to face her. His cheeks felt warm, his feet cold, and he just didn’t need to see her face stare at him in horror. Not again. She finally forgave him for having Galra blood.

“Its not just that Shiro doesn’t know you love him, its how you love him. He doesn’t know you like men, does he?”

Keith jerked his eyes up then back down, inhaling sharp and holding his breath. If he didn’t deny or confirm anything, there was always a chance she may think she misread the situation. “He’s like a brother to me.” Old reliable. Something that always put other people at ease but still conveyed an iota of truth. He did love Shiro, but other people typically didn’t want to know how much, let alone how that love had developed and changed over the years.

“That’s bullshit.” Allura snapped, and Keith jerked his eyes up in surprise. She huffed at him, arms folded under her breasts. “You two have been pining for each other since the moment I saw you two. Shiro hid it better at first, but you both act like you are dancing an Arulian catter-mik and trying everything in your power to not acknowledge you both want the other. Its both frustrating and infuriating.” She looked as if she might stomp her foot like a petulant child, but she managed to only huff in his face, and Keith swallowed hard.

“But, that’s not…”

“That’s exactly what it looks like! You give each other moon eyes behind the others’ backs, you touch like its some ingrained need, and lets not forget the inside jokes and knowing looks. You two are lying to each other-”

“-possible.” Keith finished, his mouth dry.

“Why isn’t it?”

“Look at how… you just…” he was breathing too quick, his heart pounding furious and scared. But she just looked at him, like she was actually trying to understand, and he hated that he had to be in outer space for someone to want to listen. “It can’t happen.” He choked out, and his helmet slipped from his fingers, hitting the hangar bay floor with a thud.

Allura frowned, her brows knitting together with that motherly concern on her face. She reached for him, her fingers brushed across his wrist, and he jerked backward like he had been electrocuted.

“Why, Keith?”

“It doesn’t work like that.” He got the words out, just barely.

“I don’t understand. Is this an earthling custom?”

“No.” He hissed, because it was so much more than something simple like a custom. But it was so easy. Logically he knew this, he knew he could march up to him and tell Shiro anything, how it had started as them being friends, to brothers, to something just beyond it, and the day Keith realized he compared every guy he had ever been in a relationship with - no matter how secretive or quiet - to Shiro. And he knew, without any doubt, that Shiro would never think less of him. They had gone through so much, and that was before they left earth.

“You’re not going to lose him.” Allura said, firm and gentle all at once. Said in that same way that Shiro might to one of the others.

“Yeah, I will.” He stooped down, picking up his helmet with shaking fingers.

“You will if you don’t tell him.”

“How is this supposed to work, huh? If I don’t tell him, everything stays the same and I can at least know we are friends. I say one thing to him and it could blow everything to hell. He could hate me, and how is that supposed to help the team? He could…” he swallowed, hating how scared and hopeful he felt just thinking it, “he could love me back… but what will that do to the team? He can’t start favoring me-”

“Shiro is not the type.”

“But I am!” he clenched his jaw and stepped back, hands trembling. “I’ll always try my hardest to do what is best for the team. I’ll follow Shiro just like I always have. But if something happens… if everyone was hurt and I had to make a choice between him and the others, I can’t say I could keep cool and make the right call. Not after losing him already. I know what it’s like. I can’t…”

His throat closed up and he blinked several times, the heat building. Allura reached for him, and he flinched, and shame clouded around him.

“I understand.” She whispered.

Keith hated her a little for that, because he believed her when she said she did know. He hated himself for needing to hide a part of himself, not because he really thought Shiro would think less of him for being gay, but because he didn’t want to ever see that look on his face that just confirmed there wasn’t a chance in hell. He didn’t want Shiro to know because it was too hard to allow people in, because they inevitably faded away from his life and left him alone and broken. Shiro had come back. There was a second chance with him, but if he admitted it, if he allowed himself to go there and try, when that day came when the universe decided he didn’t deserve anything good, he would be ruined all over again. He couldn’t tape himself back together when all that remained were ashes; and that’s what he would be if something happened to Shiro again.

He didn’t want to tell Shiro, because if Shiro did love him, there was no coming back from that. Someone like Shiro would ruin Keith for anyone else. He would die alone on a lonely stretch of land in the middle of a desert, with memories of a time when someone loved him so much he had no doubts.

Keith felt her thumb brush over his cheek and felt the coolness of drying tears left in its wake. She cupped his face then, and he stared at her, gazing up at what little difference in height there was between them, and he gripped his helmet all the tighter in his other hand.

“I understand,” she whispered again, her own eyes shining, and Keith fell into her words, absorbing them, knowing at least one person in the universe understood what it was like to lose, to find, and then lose someone they loved all over again.

  
He averted his eyes, and pulled back to wipe his nose on the back of his hand. “I need to go.”

“When this mission is over, when we have finally won, will you consider telling him?” Allura tilted her head, and he could see from the corner of his eye how hopeful she looked.

He shrugged, nodding.

“Be safe,” She said, patting his shoulder, “and come back to us.”

“I will.” He climbed into the cockpit, pulled his helmet on, and heard Shiro’s voice in his ear.

“They’re here.”

Keith powered up the engines, taking a moment to breathe, to collect himself, to find his center, and find his focus. He’d follow Shiro anywhere, do whatever was needed. As he launched, he spied Allura from the safety of the airlock watch him go, and he knew she was also right. Once this was over, once they won, maybe….

**Author's Note:**

> Season of Sheith, like, holy cow peoples. 
> 
> So anyway, This is me trying verbage how I feel about watching these two dance around each other. Until we get an actual backstory about Shiro and Keith, I feel like there is this orbiting thing the two do. They are so aware of each other, and yet, moments that linger a little too long between them, its like they try to pretend like it didn't happen. Like they are doing their best to not make the other uncomfortable, and yet, they both are feeling the same without the other realizing it. 
> 
> It reminds me of a crush I had on a guy, where even a decade later, I still feel that all encompassing emotion of wanting to be with him.... but I never said anything because how could someone like that possibly want someone like me. People lie to themselves on the outside all the time, even if they are honest to themselves on the inside. And sometimes, those secrets choke the host till they couldn't tell you the truth if they wanted. I feel like, maybe... that's what's happening with Shiro and Keith.


End file.
